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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25193293">A Long Wait</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH'>INMH</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>hc_bingo fanfiction fills 2020 [9]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse), Resident Evil - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Drama, Exhaustion, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Relationships, Strong Language, Unconsciousness</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 08:56:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,235</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25193293</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Carlos waits for Jill to wake up.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Carlos Oliveira &amp; Jill Valentine, Carlos Oliveira/Jill Valentine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>hc_bingo fanfiction fills 2020 [9]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1789369</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>31</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Long Wait</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Carlos drags a chair over to Jill’s bedside and plops down in it.<br/><br/>And then he waits.<br/><br/>He spends a long time staring at her, only at one point to ask himself what the fuck he’s doing: Jill’s been poisoned, infected by whatever that big motherfucker of a monster stuck her with, and isn’t going to wake up any time soon. Watching her while she sleeps and wondering if she’s going to open her eyes any second now is pointless.<br/><br/>Carlos’s head dips, forehead brushing the backrest of the chair. It’s been… Fuck. How long has it even been since he’s slept? He’s been awake and alert since eight AM on September 27<sup>th</sup> and he’s barely had a chance to shut his eyes since. He got, <em>maybe</em> an hour’s worth of broken sleep before he got to Jill, but that’s a drop in a ten-gallon bucket that’s not worth shit beyond stopping Carlos from having a seizure or actually passing out from exhaustion.<br/><br/>Now, though, now would be a good time to get some sleep. Carlos isn’t going to find any place as a secure and safe as the hospital short of leaving the city, and even then its fucking infested with zombies and giant fucking lizard monsters, which doesn’t exactly put him in a mood for sleep. But he can’t take for granted that he’s going to have another chance or that they’ll be able to get out of the city soon after Jill wakes up, and there’s no way of knowing how much energy he’s going to need before they reach actual stability and safety.<br/><br/>It would be good for him to <em>not</em> get murdered by a lizard-monster because he’s too tired to pull his gun out fast enough.<br/><br/>“<em>Unh.</em>”<br/><br/>Carlos’s head jerks up. “Jill?”<br/><br/>“<em>Ugh.</em>” Her face is screwed up in discomfort.<br/><br/>Carlos scoots the chair closer to the bed, reaching out and patting her arm. “Jill, hey, you awake?” Even if she is, it doesn’t mean they’re going anywhere right now, but it’ll at least mean that she’s turned the corner.<br/><br/>Jill stirs and grunts a few more times, and then falls still and silent. Her breathing is steady and deep, and though Carlos is satisfied that she’s not currently dying, he’s disappointed that she’s still not awake. He bumps the chair back a little bit just to be sure that she doesn’t suddenly wake up and see him two inches from her face and staring at her like a freak.<br/><br/>That would be almost as undesirable as being ripped apart by one of those lizard-monsters.          <br/><br/>So Carlos backs off, shuts his eyes and lets his head dip again, folding his arms on the backrest of the chair and setting his head down on top of them. He tries to relax, tries to shut off his brain and drift off.<br/><em><br/>It’s cool. There are a bunch of sealed and locked doors between you and the bowels of the hospital, where more zombies or monsters might be waiting to rip you limb from limb. You’ll <b>probably</b> hear them coming before they get into the room.</em><br/><em><br/>(Probably.)</em><br/><em><br/>It’s just for a little while. Just a little bit of sleep.</em><br/><em><br/>And then-</em><br/><b><em><br/>-clang!</em></b><br/><br/>Carlos jumps out of the chair, flopping to the floor and hands scrambling for his sidearm. It only occurs to him after getting it into his hands that this is the <em>worst</em> possible thing he could have done, because anything out in the lobby will now know that he’s here. On the bed, Jill hasn’t even stirred, and Carlos is kind of grateful for that because he’s determined <em>not</em> to make a fool of himself in front of her.<br/><br/>Slowly, he crawls to the door and pushes it open. Carlos scans the lobby: It is empty. A few seconds of listening, and he does not hear any moaning or shuffling or heavy footsteps or growling. There’s a can rolling on the ground near the desk, and even though it makes <em>no fucking sense</em> to do so, Carlos trains his gun on it. There’s always a possibility that it was on the edge of the counter and has been on the verge of falling long before it actually did, but Carlos isn’t really in the sort of situation where he can just <em>assume</em> those sorts of things.<br/><br/>There’s a fluttering above his head, and Carlos brings his gun up to search for the thing that’s flapping around and circling right below the ceiling-<br/><br/>It’s a bird.<br/><br/>It’s just a <em>fucking</em> bird. Probably got in through a broken window or a vent, or at some point when whoever was here earlier evacuated.<br/><br/>Carlos’s eyes roll shut. He shoves his gun back into its holster and rubs his face as he hobbles back into the side-room, dropping back into the chair and shaking his head. God, he is <em>way</em> too wired to sleep, but he at least needs to try. He lets his head fall again, and this time he manages to make his way into that murky area between sleep and waking where he can still hear and process what’s going on around him to an extent, just enough to hear Jill breathing when-<br/><b><em><br/>BOOM.</em></b><br/><br/>Carlos jerks up, head whipping towards the window. The ground shudders slightly, and then stops. He forces himself out of the chair and creeps over to the window, careful not to move too much as he parts the blinds; the zombies are good enough to spot even smaller movements, and he can’t be sure there aren’t any lurking outside.<br/><br/>In the distance, a building is on fire. Smoke is curling into the air, and Carlos figures that a smaller fire probably spread to a gas tank or something and sent the whole building up. Some of it probably collapsed, which would have led to the ground shaking for a bit after the fact.<br/><br/>“Not that close,” Carlos mumbles, carefully fixing the shades and stepping back from the window. “Probably nothing to worry about.” And if it became something to worry about, the hospital still had power: The fire alarm would go off if the system detected that the building was on fire.<br/><br/>“Hm?”<br/><br/>Carlos starts, and then turns around.<br/><br/>Jill’s eyes are open, but unfocused. She’s squinting, blinking sluggishly. Carlos hurries over, putting one hand on her shoulder and bracing the other near her side on the bed. “Jill, hey, you awake? Talk to me, Jill.”<br/><br/>“Hmm.” Jill blinks up at him, her expression unresponsive. But then her hand brushed against his arm, gripped it lightly before falling away. Jill’s eyes slipped shut again, though this time she seemed to fight to keep them open.<br/><br/>Carlos lets out a long breath, relief palpable. He slips a hand into Jill’s and squeezes it gently. “Alright, you’re good. You’re getting better.” After a moment or two, he lets go and backs up to his chair again, sitting down and folding his arms over the back again. “It’s all good,” he tells Jill and himself. “We’ll go as soon as you’re good. I’ll hotwire a car if I have to. I’ll figure out the fastest way out. We’ll get Tyrell, we’ll get on the road, and we’ll just…”<br/><br/>Carlos means to plot out that escape route, means to figure out the nearest exit-point to the city relative to their location.<br/><br/>He’s asleep before he can even think about it.<br/> <br/>-End</p>
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